ABSTRACT OF THESIS submitted by Larisa Grujicfor the degree of Master of Science and entitled: State of the Environment Reporting on the Internet and Environmental Indicators in Central and Eastern Europe

Month and Year of submission: August, 1999

The purpose of this thesis was to analyze the SoE reporting on the Internet as a way of communicating information on the environment to a wide audience in order to help the process of decision-making and raising of awareness. It had two aims: the first was to show a possible way of creation of a Web site containing information on the environment; the second was to present the most common environmental indicators used in SoE reports in the Region and in some international reports, as well as to show some ways of graphical presentation of the chosen indicators in order to give ideas in which way information can be presented in electronic SoE reports. 

In order to achieve thesis aims, a comparison of the Web sites containing SoE reports for 13 CEE countries was performed. This comparison consisted of two steps. First, ten different characteristics in Web site design were examined and compared with the recommended ones. Second, further comparison went deeper into the structure of the reports, examining the coverage of the environmental issues, problems, and indicators, as well as ways of their graphical presentation. 

The first comparison showed that design of examined Web sites needs to be improved. In order to suggest how to present this information and avoid the common problems in design, a sample Web site has been prepared. It offers a pattern which can be followed when presenting information on the environment on the Web. Further comparison proved that it is possible to find a limited number of common environmental indicators to be used in these reports, but that work on their harmonization should be continued. Finally, graphical presentation of information on the Web is a problem that also requires further research and improvement. 

Keywords: state of the environment reporting, environmental indicators, Internet, Central and Eastern Europe, information, Web page design, graphical presentation